


so i know you’re there too

by inconocible



Series: as a shrike to your sharp and glorious thorn [3]
Category: Red Dead Redemption
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, But Goddamnit Do I Have Feelings, Chapter 3, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Family Feels, Found Family, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Injured Arthur Morgan, M/M, Panicking Dutch van der Linde, Post-Mission: Blessed Are the Peacemakers, Spoilers Do Not Interact, The Author Has Only Reached the End of Chapter 3, rated M for cursing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-13
Updated: 2018-12-13
Packaged: 2019-09-17 08:47:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,025
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16971486
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/inconocible/pseuds/inconocible
Summary: But when Arthur, from his lean-to just next to Dutch’s tent, calls out, “Dutch!” the third time, Dutch is shocked into action, on his feet in a flash, struggling into his britches, shrugging an old flannel chores shirt on over his undershirt, his heart likely beating strong and fast enough, now, to crack through his ribs. Oh, Dutch is awake as hell now, no matter what his body is trying to tell him otherwise, goddamnit.





	so i know you’re there too

**Author's Note:**

> in one of them i’m dying  
> in one i never do  
> in one of them you’re breathing  
> so i know [you’re there too](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bxmKVAvMDa4)

Molly’s side of the cot is empty, but it’s still warm, when Dutch rolls over, reaches out into the space where she ought to be.

Dutch is a light sleeper -- always has been, always will be. It’s kept him alive, more than a couple times, over the years.

Which is why he finds himself surprised as hell, as he pushes up onto an elbow, to see two silhouettes outside his tent, to hear, above the familiar soft sounds of the fire crackling and the camp mostly asleep outside, the water-rush of two voices, whispering furiously. Shit, if he weren’t so exhausted, he should’ve woken up the minute the conversation started, the moment Molly stirred out of bed.

Dutch sits up straighter, tries to reach for wakefulness despite how fucking _tired_ he feels, despite the dull, painful ache that’s thudding through his bones and his muscles and his head and his heart.

It’s a man and a woman, talking outside, Dutch knows, even as he scrubs both his hands over his face, sighs heavily into his palms. Definitely Molly, he concludes, from the lilt of the woman’s whisper, but who -- ?

Dutch groans softly, trying to wake himself up, pressing the heels of his hands into his orbital sockets until stars bloom behind his closed eyelids.

“You’ve got to let him rest, Mister Matthews,” Molly’s saying, her voice rising in pitch and in volume outside, frustration plain in her tone. “You don’t understand, he’s --”

Dutch feels anger, then, sparking through his fatigue like a lit match on dry tinder, bringing with it a sense of awareness and alertness.

“What _I_ believe _you_ don’t _understand_ , Miss O’Shea,” he calls out, gruff, pissed off, a little muffled behind the palms of his hands still cupping his face, “is that Mister Matthews is one of the few folks who's got the right to wake me up, any time, day or night, regardless of what the _hell_ else is going on!”

“Come in, please, Hosea!” Dutch adds, finally lifting his hands from his face, sighing out a heavy exhale, watching as Hosea lifts the tent flap, takes a few steps inside, Molly trailing him, her shawl pulled tight around her shoulders over her nightgown and her arms crossed over her chest, scowling at both of them.

“Dutch,” she says, “you’ve barely slept --” but Dutch doesn’t care about, nor does he even hear, the rest of her argument, because the faint cry that pierces the calm of the camp outside chills him to the bone.

“Dutch -- _Dutch_!” and, oh -- Dutch would know that voice anywhere.

“Ah, Christ, Arthur,” he whispers, and it’s as though he’s been arrested, paralyzed, by the pain in Arthur’s voice.

But when Arthur, from his lean-to just next to Dutch’s tent, calls out, “Dutch!” the third time, Dutch is shocked into action, on his feet in a flash, struggling into his britches, shrugging an old flannel chores shirt on over his undershirt, his heart likely beating strong and fast enough, now, to crack through his ribs. Oh, Dutch is awake as _hell_ now, no matter what his body is trying to tell him otherwise, goddamnit.

“What’s goin’ on with our boy, Hosea?” he asks, gruff, as he fights with clasp of his pants, the buttons on his shirt.

Hosea sighs. “Runnin’ a hell of a fever,” he says, and, damn, Hosea sounds so old, so _weary_ , it hurts nearly as much as the sound of Arthur’s pain.

“Jesus Christ, fucking Colm,” Dutch swears, gritting his teeth as he finishes buttoning up his shirt.

“Believe he’s set to wake up half the county, needin’ you, Dutch,” Hosea adds.

Dutch meets Hosea’s tired eyes, willing his hands to stop shaking as he steps into and tugs on his boots. “Is he -- ?” Dutch asks, fumbling for his gun belt, resolutely ignoring the fear that’s making him so clumsy, that’s stealing away the end of his question.

“He ain’t gonna die,” Hosea says, “if that’s what you’re askin’,” but there’s not nearly enough conviction in Hosea’s tone for Dutch to really believe him. Hosea sighs again. “Just scared. Hurting.”

“Dutch,” Arthur’s calling again, but it’s so weak, this time, Dutch isn’t sure he’d’ve heard it if he weren’t listening for it, a quiet, unnatural sound, like a wounded animal’s, filtering through the night.

Dutch exhales a heavy, anxious sigh around the word, “God.” Something in Hosea’s face shifts, softens, and he takes the few steps to close the distance between himself and Dutch, lays his hand on Dutch’s shoulder, squeezes it.

“We’ll be alright,” Hosea murmurs, in his most impossibly gentle of ways. Dutch closes his eyes, briefly, draws a breath in through his nose, savoring, for just a quick moment, the warmth and weight of Hosea’s hand, anchoring him to the here and now. He opens his eyes, nods at Hosea, lets his breath resolutely out through his mouth.

Hosea doesn’t let go of Dutch, just shifts where his hand is on his shoulder, and they cross the tent together, Hosea not more than half a step behind Dutch.

“But you’d only just gotten to sleep,” Molly tries.

Dutch pauses with one hand on the flap of the tent, turns to look at her. Molly’s followed them to the tent’s opening, and she lays a hand on Dutch’s wrist. “Miss Grimshaw can --” she starts, but he bares his teeth at her, a frustrated growl escaping him as he shakes her off.

“Molly,” Dutch says, quiet, mad.

He’s been feeling more and more like that damn character from Stevenson’s story, recently: A goddamn nightmare, living, somehow, inside a perfectly civilized man. And the kind, genteel, upstanding side of himself is already regretting the way he’s speaking to Molly, but the worried, exhausted, frightened, furious, hurt _monster_ side is reaping some fucked-up kind of satisfaction from the way she flinches away from him.

“You goddamn listen to me,” he snaps. “Every single one of these people, in this camp, including you -- I love, and would lay my life down for. But, Molly --” he points a finger at her -- “let me tell you plain, right now: Hosea, and our two, dear, boys, who we have raised, together, since they was barely kids, Arthur, and John?” Dutch shakes his head. “There will never, _ever_ , be _anyone_ ,more important to me, than the three of them.”

Dutch turns and pulls back the flap of the tent quickly, knowing, but somehow not able to bring himself to care, that it’s a cowardly move, a move that lets him pretend not to see the hurt on Molly’s face.

*

And then he just gets more of the goddamn same once he’s crossed the short distance between his tent and Arthur’s lean-to, from Susan, this time, and, oh, he is not fucking having it.

“You barely slept in the three days he was gone,” she’s arguing, “I don’t know why Mister Matthews got you up, I would’ve told him not to --”

“Miss Grimshaw,” Dutch cuts in frustratedly, but their argument is momentarily drowned out by Arthur, stirring in his cot, pushing himself halfway up to sitting with a pained groan. The blanket slides down his chest, and the view of Arthur’s injured shoulder, bandaged ribs and bruised torso stokes a blinding rage to life within Dutch, giving him half a mind to turn heel and saddle up The Count, find Colm’s sorry ass, wring the life out of his coward neck with his own fucking bare hands --

“ _Dutch_ ,” Arthur croaks, and Susan’s still got her hands out in front of her, like she really thinks she can turn Dutch away from Arthur at this point, when not even Hell itself probably could.

“Mister Van der Linde,” Susan fires back, moving her hands to her hips, now, planting her feet, but Dutch is all tensed up for a fight, too, interrupts her with a harsh, “For Christ’s sake, Susan, get the hell out of my way!”

Hosea’s hand slides down from Dutch’s shoulder to grasp his forearm, even as Dutch is thrusting his chest out, toying with the idea of just reaching out, shoving her aside. “Easy, Dutch,” he murmurs.

“Hosea and I,” Dutch starts, fierce, quick, “have cared for Arthur, _loved_ him and _raised_ him --” and Dutch is pointing at Susan with his free hand, and his fury is rising to a breaking point, cracking his voice desperately -- “for twenty goddamn _years_ , and if you fucking think --”

“ _Dutch_ ,” Hosea says again, gripping his arm a little tighter, at the same time that Susan exclaims, “Dutch van der Linde!”

Dutch feels the Jekyll inside himself wrest control away from the Hyde, and he deflates, his fatigue and his concern and the last remaining shreds of his goddamn decency hitting him all at once like a wet blanket.

“There are -- no doubts, in my mind,” Dutch sighs, his voice back to its normal pitch, taking Susan’s hand in both of his, even as he slyly maneuvers around her, turning her toward the exit of Arthur’s lean-to, “that you have done the most excellent job this evening, as you always do, taking care of our boy’s hurts, Miss Grimshaw. Now, please, you take your rest, and let me keep the watch awhile. Humor my old, troubled mind.”

Susan shakes her head, withdraws her hand from his grasp. “It sure has been a long twenty years, hasn’t it,” she says with a slow frown, but Dutch has already achieved his goal of sneaking around her, and he’s sinking onto the stool that’s pulled up next to the head of Arthur’s cot.

He rests his hand gently on the top of Arthur’s hair, and he misses the way Hosea sighs and apologizes to Miss Grimshaw, tells her, “We’ll all feel better in the morning,” shoos her out.

“Dutch,” Arthur’s gasping, reaching for him, and Dutch pays no mind to Hosea pulling the empty chair up beside him, can’t bother to notice anything else in the world right now except the unnatural flush to Arthur’s face, the god-awful bruising that mottles his body, the angry redness of the skin peeking out around his bandaged shoulder that looks to Dutch like it’s no more than a prayer and a dream away from a deadly infection.

“Alright, Arthur,” Dutch says, taking Arthur’s outstretched hand in one of his, reaching down with his other hand to pull Arthur’s blanket back up over his bruised torso, then reaching back up, brushing Arthur’s wild, uncombed hair off his too-hot forehead. “I’ve got you now, you’re alright.”

“No,” Arthur argues. “ ‘S not safe.”

“We sure are safe,” Dutch counters. “Just as soon as you beat this goddamn fever, my dear boy, we’ll all be safe.”

“They’re --” and Arthur shudders, shivers, groans, closing his eyes, gripping Dutch’s hand harder.

“Shh,” Dutch soothes, petting Arthur’s hair, and he becomes aware of Hosea, sitting there beside him, all of a sudden, when one of Hosea’s hands comes to rest halfway down Dutch’s back.

“Here,” Hosea says, and he passes Dutch a damp cloth with his other hand, leaning his body into Dutch’s, a solid warmth that Dutch has been missing too much, recently.

“No, listen, Dutch, dammit,” Arthur whispers, and his eyes are still squeezed shut, and his voice is still slurred with pain and fever, but somehow his ideas seem to be coming out a little more sensibly. “You gotta get outta here. We ain’t safe.”

Dutch keeps holding Arthur’s uninjured hand in one of his, as he reaches up with his other hand and presses the cloth gently to Arthur’s forehead. “We are,” he says. “And I ain’t going nowhere.”

Arthur shakes his head. “No,” he insists. “Colm --” and he groans, grits his teeth. “Ah, God almighty, ’m hurtin’,” he says.

“I know, it’s alright. It’s alright,” Dutch says, wiping at Arthur’s brow with the damp cloth, trying to cool him down. “You got away from that son of a bitch, did such a good job, Arthur. We’re gonna get you better, now, now you’re home.”

“I had to,” Arthur croaks. “I couldn’t -- couldn’t let you -- goddamnit, Dutch.” Arthur looks sincerely up at Dutch, his eyes all glassy with his fever and with what Dutch realizes are tears, threatening to fall. His bottom lip trembles. “Dutch,” Arthur says again, his voice dropped to a slow, shaky whisper, and he bites his bottom lip, but it does nothing, except for maybe make everything worse, because he heaves a sudden, sharp, sobbing breath in, closes his eyes, tears starting to filter through his eyelashes, run down his flushed cheeks. “ ’m sorry,” Arthur whispers.

“Oh, no, no, you’re okay, darlin’,” Dutch says. “You’re okay,” he says, but it’s probably been a good ten years, at least, since Dutch has seen Arthur brought to tears, and the sight of it is rending his heart in two.

“Oh, Arthur,” Hosea murmurs, reaching for the damp cloth, taking it from Dutch’s hand, dipping it and wringing it into the bucket of water at his feet.

“They -- they were gonna kill you,” Arthur manages in a quivery, broken voice, taking sobbing breaths between his words, tears rolling freely down his cheeks, now, “or, or turn you in to the goddamn _law_ , Dutch, I _couldn’t_ let you come for me, walk into a goddamn fucking trap, I couldn’t, I --”

“Shh,” Dutch says. “It’s okay.”

Hosea passes the damp cloth back to Dutch, starts running the flat of his warm, open palm in a slow, steady line line up and down the length of Dutch’s spine.

“No, it _ain’t_ ,” Arthur’s arguing. “Dutch, you _can’t_ ,” he’s saying, finally opening his eyes again. “You can’t get caught, or, or -- die -- I’d --”

“No, no, no, that’s not gonna happen, and you know it,” Dutch promises him, reaching for his face, using the cloth to wipe his tears away, soothe the fever-hotness of his cheeks. “Easy, easy, now,” he says, and Dutch’s voice is a goddamn traitor, the way it breaks around the lump in his throat. “Don’t you go dying on me, either, now, you hear me? We have got to get this fever of yours down, my dear boy. So you stop worryin’ and start healing, Arthur.”

Arthur takes another shuddering breath, closes his eyes again, shakes his head. “It hurts,” he says. “Everything hurts, Dutch, you can’t, I, I can’t --”

“I’m sorry, Arthur,” Dutch says, and he’s biting his lip, and he’s tightening his jaw, and he’s squeezing his eyes shut -- _anything_ to hold in the harsh sob that’s constricting his lungs, but he fails, lurching forward on the stool, his body folding in half at the waist as he presses his face gently into the space just above Arthur’s uninjured shoulder, releasing the sob into Arthur’s blanket. “I am so sorry, darlin’,” Dutch whispers, and it’s not even that he’s crying -- his eyes are gritty and tired and dry. It’s just that he can’t catch his breath, all of a sudden, feels it leaving him like a galloping horse, too quick and panicked and out of his control. 

“No, ‘m sorry,” Arthur says, turning his head to the side, pressing his forehead against the top of Dutch’s hair, breathing into the same space as Dutch. “God, ’m sorry for all this mess, Dutch,” he whispers.

“It’s alright,” Dutch whispers back, but his chest hurts, and his hands and arms are shaking like hell, and he can’t control his breath, and Arthur grips his hand a little tighter.

“Shit, don’t be all upset,” Arthur murmurs, through his own still-sobbing breaths. “You’re right, Dutch, we’re -- we’re gonna be alright,” he says, and Dutch appreciates the sentiment, but he hates how much Arthur clearly doubts what he’s saying.

“Oh, my dear Dutch, you sure are exhausted, like the ladies were trying to tell you, aren’t you,” Hosea observes, impossibly kind, and yet somehow making Dutch acutely feel every year of age that Hosea’s got on him, making Dutch feel like a young, emotional fool, a fool who’s ruined everything he’s ever touched, put the lives of so many people in danger.

Dutch feels Hosea take the damp cloth back again, feels Hosea still rubbing his hand up and down Dutch’s back, but he can’t bring himself to pull away, to lift his head. He’s still leaning his head into Arthur’s, still trying to catch his panicky, run-away breath, his head still spinning with the idea of Arthur, of all people, dying, all because of Colm _fucking_ O’Driscoll.

How long the three of them sit like that, in such an awful, fragile, intimate stillness, Dutch couldn’t say. Maybe twenty more years, on top the twenty they’ve already passed together. Maybe just two fleeting minutes.

“Arthur?” Hosea asks gently, at length. “D’you feel better, with Dutch here?”

Arthur sniffs. “ ‘m not gonna pretend like I ain’t hurtin’, Hosea, but I -- well, you know I always feels better with Dutch around,” he drawls, and Dutch lifts his head, straightens his back, sees that Arthur’s not crying any longer, that his face is splotchy and red, but dry. Arthur’s eyes are closed, pain written plainly in the lines that’ve started etching themselves into his face, these past ten or so years.

“Dutch?” Hosea asks, and he’s peering around Dutch’s shoulder, running his hand over the top of Dutch’s head, gripping the back of his neck, a grounding, questioning touch. “You good?”

Dutch sighs. His chest fucking _hurts_ , the way it always does after a panicky spell like this, but he can mostly breathe normally again, and his hands aren’t too badly shaky. “I suppose, Hosea.”

Hosea makes a noise in the back of his throat like he doesn’t really believe Dutch, but he still asks, “You reckon you could both get some rest, now? Sure could use it.”

Dutch and Arthur lock eyes, an unspoken question drifting between them. Hosea leans forward again, around Dutch, presses the back of his hand against Arthur’s forehead and cheeks, makes another unhappy noise in the back of his throat, clicks his tongue against his teeth, shakes his head. “You need some goddamn rest, Arthur,” Hosea says, the open affection in his tone softening his curse. He frowns, pulls his hand back. “Fight this thing off.”

Dutch’s free hand drifts to Arthur's face, cupping his warm cheek. “Don't you die, you hear me?” Dutch whispers.

“I hear,” Arthur sighs, nearly sounding like his usual self, but his eyes are still locked to Dutch’s. “Dutch, I --” he starts, suddenly serious again, but he closes his mouth, sighs again, shakes his head.

“What?” Dutch says. “What is it?”

Arthur bites his bottom lip again, looks away, down toward his feet. “Don’t go,” he asks, shy, soft. “I -- I was havin’ such bad dreams, I --” He sighs. “Don’t go.”

“Of course not,” Dutch says, squeezing Arthur’s hand, running his other thumb over Arthur's cheekbone. “Of course. I ain’t going nowhere.”

“But Dutch,” Hosea says. “You will have knots in your back the size of the Grizzlies if you sit there on that stool all night.” Dutch scowls at him, but Hosea just rolls his eyes and shakes his head as he stands up, wanders off to his own tent.

Hosea comes back not three minutes later, with his extra bedroll and a magazine in his arms. “Hosea,” Dutch says, annoyed, but Hosea glares at him, raises one eyebrow, holds the bedroll out to him.

Arthur had closed his eyes when Hosea got up, but he’s watching them again, now, and he smirks, shakes his head a little at them.

“You lay down, now, Dutch,” Hosea says pointedly, providing no space to argue.

“What about you?” Dutch asks, raising an eyebrow at him.

“Me? I’ve got a chair with a back and a new Conrad serial,” Hosea says, holding up his copy of _Blackwood’s_ , and he’s narrowing his eyes menacingly at Dutch, but there’s still a gentle, fond smile playing around the rest of his face. “Plus, unlike other people, I did actually sleep while Arthur was gone from our presence, so, unlike other people, I do actually have the energy to sit up on watch.”

Dutch makes an unsatisfied noise in the back of his throat, and he rolls his eyes more, glares at Hosea, but he still sighs, “Fine, fine.” He gets up, stepping out of his boots and putting them under the stool, unbuckling his gun holster and laying it on top of the stool, unbuttoning the top button of his flannel.

Arthur huffs the smallest ghost of a laugh out through his nose, watching them negotiate. “Y'all sure do know how to make me feel like a kid again,” he murmurs sleepily.

Hosea throws the bedroll down onto the mat next to Arthur’s cot, and Dutch lowers himself carefully to the ground, tucks himself into Hosea’s familiar covers, all old, worn furs and skins that are soft to the touch, and that smell so strongly of Hosea that Dutch feels himself relax more than he’d realized he’d needed to.

Arthur reaches down and out with his uninjured hand, reaches for Dutch, and his hand, hanging off the edge of the cot, lands on top of Dutch’s hair, his fingers digging in ever so gently, and Dutch feels himself relax that much more.

“Alright?” Arthur asks.

“Mm,” Dutch sighs, from the back of his throat.

A long, still moment passes, Dutch and Arthur’s breathing slowly synchronizing, Arthur flexing his fingers gently in Dutch’s hair. Hosea has pulled his chair up closer to the both of them, laying the damp cloth back over Arthur’s forehead, and he stretches his legs out, opens his _Blackwood’s_. Dutch feels his eyes drift closed.

At length, when Dutch is almost asleep again, Arthur sighs. “I’m scared, Hosea,” he says in a small, groggy voice.

Dutch forces his eyes open, but just that takes so much effort that he doesn’t lift his head. He suddenly can’t find the energy to do anything but look up, at Hosea, at the way he frowns, leans forward, lays his magazine face-down on its open page on the edge of Arthur’s cot, picks up the cloth from Arthur’s forehead, soaks it in the bucket again and wrings it out, folds it, replaces it on Arthur’s forehead, lays his open hand on the top of Arthur’s hair.

“Why are you scared, my boy, huh?” Hosea says. “There ain’t nothin’ to be afraid of. We’ve got you. We’re alright. You just gotta heal up, now.”

“I ain’t scared for me, Hosea,” Arthur says, thoughtful and quiet, and his fingers tighten their grip on Dutch’s hair, just a little. Dutch realizes that neither of them know he’s still awake, watching them, that neither of them have thought to look down. “It’s all this goddamn _mess_. Dutch ain’t --”

“Oh, Dutch is alright,” Hosea says gently. “I promise you that. ‘S long as me, and John, and you, keep breathin’? Old Dutch’ll be just fine.”

Hosea picks up his magazine again, leans back in his chair. “We’re all gonna be just fine,” he says. “You go back to sleep.”

“I don’t know,” Arthur sighs, but his hand on Dutch’s head relaxes slightly, as though he’s giving in to Hosea, or trying, at least. Dutch sighs softly, too, closes his eyes again.

Arthur yawns. “What’re you readin’?” he asks sleepily.

“New Conrad serial,” Hosea answers. “You wanna listen?”

“Sure,” Arthur says.

“Alright,” Hosea says. “Always did put you to sleep as a kid,” he says, and Dutch can nearly hear the smile that he knows has to be on Hosea’s face, thinks back to those first days of the three of them traveling together, twenty something years ago, Hosea helping Arthur remember how to read, Hosea reading out loud to the three of them at night. God, it’s been so long since things were that simple.

“Okay, where was I,” Hosea’s asking himself. “Ah, yes.” He clears his throat, and his voice shifts to the gentle timbre he always takes when he’s reading out loud, steady and deep and familiar and comforting, and he picks up where he’d left off in the Conrad serial. “‘And this also,’ said Marlow suddenly, ‘has been one of the dark places of the earth.’”

**Author's Note:**

> uhh hello i'm typically a star wars and scifi situation, but? this family?? is giving me so many feelings????  
> helP  
> tumblr (rip, but i'm still there, for now): [inconocible](https://inconocible.tumblr.com/)


End file.
